Taylor Lautner: College Is a Possibility

Twilight hunk Taylor Lautner made his first appearance on The Late Show With David Letterman last night and talked about reports he's headed back to college.

The teen idol suggested maybe one day he'd return, "as long as I'm not working."

"I finished high school, I immediately enrolled in my local community college, but as soon as Twilight hit it's kind of hard to do anything," Lautner said.

The thesp has been making the media rounds this week to plug the latest Twilight adventure. And it's working. The Eclipse sequel set an opening-night record as it collected $30 million from midnight screenings and, with 4,416 theaters, is also the widest release ever.

As for going shirtless in most of the movie, a jovial Lautner said it's all in the nature of the beast—and the books.

"He's a werewolf and when you transform into a werewolf apparently all your clothes tear off," he noted. "When they tear off they're left with nothing, but out of courtesy we pack little jean shorts throughout the forest and we throw those on."

On how he ended up in movies, the 18-year-old actor told Dave he got some encouragement while growing up in Michigan from an unexpected mentor.

"I was doing martial arts at the time and my karate instructor was involved in the business and he's the one who kind of got me started...He was actually the blue Power Ranger for a year," laughed Lautner.

When asked about who would win in a showdown between Team Edward vs. Team Jacob, he demurred initially.

"[Werewolves] are very strong and we all are very fast. And we work as a pack," he told Letterman. "That's kind of our thing. But it would be a tough call."

But when the gap-toothed comic pressed on, saying that a werewolf with rabies might be formidable, Lautner gave the edge to Team Jacob.

He also discussed the Twilight saga's highly devoted fan base.

"Different fans choose to show their passion in different ways and a lot of times, it's screaming," he said. "In Japan, they're very sensitive, they cry a lot...they start crying and so you feel bad, so you'll touch them...and say, 'It's OK, it's OK, we're gonna be all right.' And then they start crying some more."

"So then you grab them with two hands, grab their shoulders and say, 'It's gonna be just fine,' and then they start bawling and eventually they just faint and problem solved."